LT's surprise ‘gift’ a winner

Yet the truth is surely more nuanced than most of the theories in circulation. As a classic cutback runner, Tomlinson is more dependent on daylight than power, and has become less of a presence on third down as Darren Sproles has become the primary backfield passing target. And as Chargers quarterback Philip Rivers pointed out yesterday, few things help the running game as much as a two-touchdown lead.

“To make the whole running game go, a lot of things have to happen — a lot of odds and ends, a lot of ins and outs,” Rivers said. “The biggest thing today, one, we're up, 14-0, for a change. We have a choice (in play-calling).”

Fullback Mike Tolbert made reference to a “little different blocking scheme.” But Pro Bowl guard Kris Dielman, customarily intolerant of half-baked theories, rejected the notion that anything had changed in the running game except the results.

“We found some plays that worked,” he said. “We ran with them and kept calling 'em and kept gashing 'em

“LT is the same. There ain't nothing (different). His number got called more times this time and you saw what he could do.”

There are a handful of plays in almost every game in which Tomlinson might have emerged from a time capsule, when his first step is as sure and his cuts are as sharp as they seemed in 2006 or 2007. But no back spends nine seasons in the NFL without losing some of his burst; especially a back of LaDainian Tomlinson's exalted caliber.

“To be honest with you, I don't even read it,” he said when asked about the many analyses of his statistical decline. “I don't even look at it.

“Obviously, when it's brought up to me, that's when I hear about it. That's how I stay this way ”

Tomlinson lifted his hands beside his face to convey tunnel vision.

“If I start thinking about the possibilities of what everyone's saying,” he said, “a person can go crazy.”